


planting seeds in a garden you never get to see

by mygalfriday (BrinneyFriday)



Category: Doctor Who (2005)
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-22
Updated: 2016-01-22
Packaged: 2018-05-15 13:08:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,080
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5786356
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/BrinneyFriday/pseuds/mygalfriday
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>His wife is gone and there is no getting her back but there’s also no reason he can’t use her tendency toward grand theft auto to communicate with the versions of her still running around the universe creating havoc. It isn’t much but for a man as old and grieved and in love as the Doctor, it is more than he ever thought he’d have again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	planting seeds in a garden you never get to see

**Author's Note:**

> Five times Twelve leaves a gift for River in the TARDIS and one time River leaves him one in return.
> 
> Story title from The World Was Wide Enough from the Broadway musical Hamilton. 
> 
> Prompt: Post-Darillium Doctor notices River has stolen his TARDIS again and starts leaving her little gifts and notes as his only way of communicating with her now.

 

After Darillium, he doesn’t stop running – not toward anything, the way he used to when she was still in his life, but away from it. From memories of twenty-four years of bliss, from the guilt he still feels at sending her to her death, from the rage that overwhelms him every time he stops to think about how fucking unfair it is that he’ll never see River as gray-haired as he is.

 

She would have preferred it that way, he knows. River burned too bright to ever settle contentedly into old age. She was always meant to die young, in a blaze of glory. Anything else would be too bloody mundane to suit her. But then he thinks of their little house on Darillium, River barefoot and humming as she stood on the porch and tossed scraps to stray cats, and thinks just maybe she might have suited old age eventually. He’d have liked to see her try her hand at it, anyway.

 

So he runs. He buries his head in the sand, sticks his fingers in his ears, and refuses to sleep. He does all he can to forget that for a precious while, he’d had everything. He’s so determined to ignore his loss that he finds himself wading into peace negotiations – something he hates and is absolutely rubbish at in this body – on a planet just outside the Delta quadrant. The talks last for a week and he sleeps for none of it. By the time he trudges back to the TARDIS, he’s weary and tetchy and ready to do something that will get his hearts going instead of his temper.

 

Even as out of sorts as he is, the moment he walks through the doors of his ship, he knows she’s been there. He freezes in place, fingers curled tightly around the doorframe, and inhales. Her perfume still lingers in the air, along with the faint stench of ozone. He just missed her.

 

Swallowing, the Doctor shuts the doors quickly lest the scent of her waft outside and away from him. He wants to keep her with him as long as he can. He’d bottle the scent if he could – the sharp smell of the vortex and something sweeter and floral, like parma violets. His mouth twitches into a little smile. So many people would be surprised to know River Song prefers such a delicate, romantic fragrance considering the woman herself is anything but delicate.

 

He knows differently. He knows her hearts are more fragile than she’d like anyone to know and she’d loved and given everything to a bastard of a Time Lord who could never quite manage to do the same in return. At least not until the very end. He hadn’t held himself back during those last years together. He’d given her every single piece of him and perhaps that’s why it hurts so much now, like his skin has been peeled away and every nerve ending is raw and exposed. Even still, he doesn’t regret loving so recklessly. If anyone deserved all of him, it had been River.

 

Breathing in one last time, the Doctor opens his eyes and pushes away from the TARDIS doors. He reaches the console and trails his fingertips over the controls, wondering idly which levers and buttons she’d touched, where she had taken his ship and for how long. He wonders if she’d slept in their bed but cannot bring himself to check. If he does, he’ll crawl under the covers and never come back out again. He can’t afford to let himself fall apart – there’s no telling if he could put himself back together.

 

Instead, he pilots the TARDIS into the vortex and contemplates his next adventure. Stalking around the console, hands behind his back, he nearly trips over something in the middle of the floor. He curses, catching himself on the edge of the console, and throws a glare at the floor that falls away the moment he catches sight of what had tripped him – a stiletto heel. He stares down at the shoe, blinking rapidly against the sudden sting in his eyes at the sight of it. It’s black, shiny leather and he vaguely recognizes it as one half of the pair she’d worn during university.

 

He swallows. A very young River Song had been in his TARDIS today.

 

Slowly, he bends to scoop up the high heel and tuts at it. “Sloppy, dear,” he mutters. “In fact, too sloppy for a trained assassin.” His mouth curls into a reluctant smile and he grips the shoe tightly, shaking his head. “Saying hello, are you?”

 

Reverently, the Doctor tucks the stiletto onto a bookshelf as a makeshift bookend and turns to contemplate the time rotor. His wife is gone and there is no getting her back but there’s also no reason he can’t use her tendency toward grand theft auto to communicate with the versions of her still running around the universe creating havoc. It isn’t much but for a man as old and grieved and in love as the Doctor, it is more than he ever thought he’d have again.

 

“Hello Sweetie,” he whispers, offering the empty room a pained grin.

 

Around him, the Old Girl hums in reply.

 

_i._

 

It’s only her second attempt at stealing the TARDIS right out from under the Doctor’s nose and River blinks in surprise when she steps through the doors and finds the ship completely changed. Gone are the warm lights and the glass floors. In its place is a darker, but not unpleasant new interior. Her sweetie has been redecorating.

 

The bookshelves are certainly a nice touch and when she catches sight of the plush leather armchairs, it’s impossible not to imagine pushing the Doctor into one and straddling him just to watch his young face blush. They’ve only met a couple of times since Berlin but River knows her favorite pastime will always be reducing that man to a living, breathing, walking stutter. She smiles to herself. It’s just so easy.

 

She moves around the console, heavy book bag hanging off one shoulder. Final exams are this week but studying is boring, especially when she can remember everything she’s read after the first glance through the pages. What she really needs is to have some fun. She takes a moment to explore the new controls first, humming her appreciation as the TARDIS whispers what each one is for in the back of her mind. It’s still odd, having a sentient ship in her head, but it’s certainly better than having the Silence there. It’s a trade-off River would take any day.

 

“Where should we go then?” She asks softly, feeling ridiculous. It’s one thing to have the ship in her head and quite another to talk to it out loud. She’s starting to sound as mad as the Doctor. “I think I fancy a drink. And a shag – but it’s a bit unseemly to steal your future husband’s time machine to get laid, even for me. So drinks? Preferably near a beach – with cabana boys. Or girls.” She wrinkles her nose. “I’m not picky.”

 

The TARDIS groans and she frowns at thin air, glancing around.

 

“Look at what?”

 

Another groan.

 

She sighs, offering the room another cursory glance and finally spotting the piece of paper taped to the wall. It’s a big black arrow pointing to one of the roundels and block letters that say **OPEN ME**. Snorting, River drops her bag full of textbooks to the floor and strides up to the wall, following the note’s instructions.

 

The roundel turns out not to be a roundel at all but more of a secret hiding space and River throws back her head and laughs in delight when she pulls it open to find her favorite brandy waiting for her inside. On the bottle is a sticky note in the same block letters as the other – _drink and drive responsibly, dear_.

 

_ii_.

 

As soon as the Doctor disappears in his TARDIS and takes her parents with him, River stoically pushes back the tears and turns to face her cell. Only moments ago, she’d been planning to record the events of the last few months in her diary – witnessing for the second time the beginning of everything. Only this time, with a full understanding her younger selves didn’t have. She’d give anything to go back and tell little Melody it’s all going to be all right in the end but at the moment, it would feel too much like a lie. And if there’s one thing River Song doesn’t do, it’s lie to herself.

 

It’s over.

 

She blinks quickly and squares her jaw, striding toward her little cot in the corner of her cell. While she’ll never see her Doctor again, never hold him or kiss him or have his complete trust ever again she also isn’t going to sit here and write it all down in her diary like a girl sobbing over some unrequited crush. She needs to shoot something. Preferably the Doctor but she’ll settle for a pub brawl. Or maybe his hat collection. The vortex manipulator stashed beneath the lumpy mattress is her only escape and she straps it hurriedly to her wrist with fingers she refuses to let shake.

 

Programming the manipulator to home in on his TARDIS, River disappears from her cell and reappears in the console room. It isn’t the console room of the Doctor she just left but she’s seen this one before – the one with all the books. Honestly, it’s like the man has forgotten the TARDIS has a library. She wonders idly what makes him change it. It doesn’t seem to fit her young husband with the boyish grin but she knows it can’t possibly belong to any of the other faces – she’s seen all of those.

 

Not that it matters which version of him this TARDIS belongs to, so long as the liquor is where she left it last. Striding down the steps and to the roundels, River yanks open the right one and breathes a sigh of relief when she finds it well stocked. Not bothering with a glass, she pulls out a bottle and uncaps it with her teeth.

 

In a flash, her traitorous mind conjures the image of him hastily backing away – running away – like she’d bitten him. He’d given her that nervous grin, terror in his eyes. _There’s a first time for everything._

 

Her throat closes up and she shuts her eyes, bringing the bottle to her lips. It burns all the way down and when she feels tears begin to build behind her eyes again, she lets them come. He’s gone and she hadn’t even known it would be the last time. She hadn’t savored it the way she always promised herself she would, hadn’t made it last forever so they’d never need to part. She’d just let him go and he’d been ever so eager to get away.

 

River takes another long gulp and lowers the bottle, wiping her mouth with the back of her hand. God, she clearly terrified him. How did he ever manage to get past all that and fall in love? Her hearts seize in her chest and she swallows roughly. What if he never did?

 

The TARDIS whirrs reassuringly and River forces her eyes open, working hard to give the Old Girl a soft smile. “He did, didn’t he?”

 

The reply in her mind is difficult to translate but amounts to _turn around, my silly child_.

 

Clutching the neck of her bottle, River whirls with a frown. There’s nothing out of place but when her eyes land on the chalkboard, she realizes there’s a message scrawled across it. No, she realizes as she steps closer. Not a message. A drawing.

 

Two stick figures – one with dramatically fluffy hair that makes River huff and roll her eyes. The other figure holds her hand, clearly meant to be the Doctor though there’s no sign of his bowtie or a ridiculous fez. In the space between them, there’s a crudely drawn heart. Beneath the drawing, he’d written an equation:

 

_You + Me = ∞_

 

Feeling a smile bloom across her face, River sets aside her bottle and strokes her fingertips gently over the rudimentary drawing. “Idiot,” she whispers fondly.

 

The TARDIS hums in merry agreement.

 

_iii_.

 

She calls out for him as she staggers into the TARDIS, quickly yanking her smoking vortex manipulator off her wrist and tossing it aside. It sparks and sputters from its place on the floor. River steps over it and drags herself to the console, throwing all over her weight into shoving the lever that will send them into the vortex.

 

“Sweetie?” She calls out again, wincing when she realizes she’s left a trail of blood all the way from the door. “Doctor, are you here?”

 

When she receives no reply, River huffs and stiffly makes her way to the med bay, grumbling under her breath about irresponsible husbands who are never around when you need them. Thankfully he keeps the med bay stocked with supplies and River finds what she needs quickly, wincing every time she moves too carelessly and jars her injured arm.

 

By the time she’s made her way around the room finding everything she needs, blood has been smeared just about everywhere. It looks like something out of a horror movie and River bites her lip guiltily, knowing she’ll have to clean it up before she leaves or she’ll give him indoors a hearts attack, poor thing.

 

It isn’t easy stitching herself up but without her wayward husband, she doesn’t have a choice. Gritting teeth against the pain and the awkward angle, River manages some haphazard stitches. They aren’t pretty but they’ll get the job done. Just another scar the Doctor can cluck his tongue over and kiss better when he finally stops scolding her recklessness.

 

Cleaning up her mess is slow going and by the time she makes her way back to the control room, she’s sore and stiff and quite prepared to fall into bed. She’ll go back to the battle once she’s healed up and fixed her manipulator. The General won’t even know she’d left. And with any luck, the Doctor won’t know she’d ever been here. River slows to a stop as she approaches the console, staring.

 

Or maybe he already does.

 

On the console are package of wet wipes and a bottle of bleach. River laughs in delight, the ache in her arm nothing but a memory as she reaches for the note taped to the console. _You missed a spot. XX_

 

She huffs. Arsehole.

 

_iv_.

 

She finds the TARDIS in a playground in Leadworth but when she glances around, there’s no sign of the Doctor anywhere - and why should there be? It’s lucky she’d even managed to find some version of the Old Girl. At the moment, there is no memory of the Doctor anywhere in the universe. It’s Amy Pond’s job to change that but first, River needs to change.

 

She takes one last look around just to be safe. There’s no one – just an old Scottish man scolding a group of children for cheating at Duck Duck Goose. Satisfied, River slips into the TARDIS and pilots the ship into the vortex. She has no particular destination in mind, letting the TARDIS decide.

 

“What does a girl wear to her own parents wedding?” She muses aloud, and the ship answers her by landing.

 

River checks the monitor.

 

“Paris, 2054.” She smiles. “Lovely choice, dear.”

 

She steps hesitantly into the first boutique across the street from the TARDIS, wondering if they’ll ask her to leave. She’s not exactly dressed for uptown shopping, still wearing her sheepskin vest, jodhpurs, and boots. She’s positive she must smell like that dusty Roman campsite.

 

When a young lady behind the counter glances up when she walks through the door, River steels herself for a confrontation. Stealing the dress she’s planning to wear to her parents’ wedding isn’t exactly ideal but needs must. If it comes to it, she’ll simply hold the girl at gunpoint and take whatever she fancies.

 

As the girl approaches, River pastes on a deceptively serene smile and casually drops her hand to her holster. “Excuse me,” the girl says, squinting at her. “But are you Melody?”

 

Blinking at her in surprise, River keeps her hand on her gun. “Who’s asking?”

 

“Oh,” the girl blushes, smiling. “Your husband told me to keep an eye out for the hair and well -” She gestures wordlessly to River’s curls and mutters, “Bit unmistakable.”

 

“My husband?” The mention of the Doctor doesn’t relax her – he shouldn’t even exist. River takes a step forward, watching the salesgirl’s eyes widen in alarm. “What do you know about my husband?”

 

The girl swallows uneasily. “He left something for you.” She makes a move toward the counter and then pauses, as if waiting for permission. At River’s nod, the girl sighs in relief and scurries behind the counter, rummaging around until she finds a box and pulls it out. She hefts it onto the counter and pushes it toward River, beaming. “He picked it out himself.”

 

River sighs, her hand dropping from her holster but her insides clenching all the same. The Doctor, however he’d managed to do something like this when he’s been erased from the bloody universe, is not a man of taste when it comes to fashion. She’ll admit she’s grown rather fond of the tweed and bowtie but she’ll never condone that damned fez.

 

With trepidation in her hearts, she reaches for the box and lifts the lid. The simple black dress inside is surprisingly tasteful, as is the black fur coat nestled alongside it. When she pulls them both out to have a look, a multi-layered pearl necklace slips out and falls at her feet. River stoops to pick it up with a perplexed smile, wondering when her ridiculous Doctor managed to acquire a sense for fashion. Perhaps his companion had picked it out.

 

Typical – making one of his pretty new friends pick out her gifts. Sometimes, she really hates him. Stroking her fingers fondly over the pearls and feeling them warm beneath her touch, River glances up at the salesgirl watching her and asks, “Did he leave a message?”

 

The girl lights up in remembrance, nodding as she leans in and imparts the message like a secret. “He said ‘ _no, you don’t’_.”

 

_v_.

 

As soon as it’s done, she goes to him. In a remarkably poor show of luck, she happens upon the TARDIS while he’s out. River sighs her disappointment and pats the doorframe, tearing up at the exultant hum of the ship around her. “I’ve missed you too, dear,” she whispers. “Both of you.”

 

The scent of fresh baked goods draws her further into the TARDIS and she sniffs out the trail with curious amusement, laughing softly when her nose leads her to a plate of scones balanced precariously on a stack of books beside his favorite armchair. Next to it is a cup of steaming tea. The scones are still warm, clotted cream melting invitingly on top of them, so River settles into the chair and helps herself.

 

“Where has he gone?” She wonders aloud, sipping the tea. She expects it to be prepared the way he takes his – with an unfortunate amount of sugar. Instead it tastes exactly as she prefers, with a dash of milk and a spoonful of honey. Smiling around the rim of the cup, River blinks away tears and murmurs, “That man.”

 

It’s been him all these years – giving her exactly what she needed just when she needed it. A drink during finals week, a drawing to give her hope, a laugh when she could use one, a little black dress with her exact measurements, and tea and scones when she’s wearier than she’s ever felt… How does he always know?

 

River eyes the ship around her with suspicion. “Did you have anything to do with this?”

 

The TARDIS remains mum.

 

Shrugging, she eats another two scones and finishes her perfectly prepared tea, letting its warmth seep into her cold bones. By the time she finishes, she’s full and warm and feels a bit more like a person – a real one with dreams and ambitions and fingers and toes and love. She feels like River Song again.

 

She leaves her teacup stacked on the empty scone plate atop the wobbly tower of books and contemplates climbing into their bed and sleeping until the Doctor returns from wherever he’s gone but that feels a bit too much like waiting. It’s been quite a while but she knows, she remembers, that River Song never waited for the Doctor. She isn’t about to start now.

 

She’ll make him chase her. He always comes running.

 

With a lightness in her hearts that will take some getting used to after years of heaviness, River leaves the cozy warmth of his armchair and approaches his chalkboard. He needs to restock his supply but she manages to find a nub of chalk left to write with. _Hello Sweetie_ , she begins.

 

_\+ i._

 

When he returns, he checks the place where he’d left her a little snack – River is a warrior and often wherever she arrives from, she’s tired and cold and hungry and he’d just wanted to feel like he was still taking care of her somehow, from a distance. When he finds the plate empty of anything but crumbs and her teacup left with only a lipstick print around the rim, he smiles and strokes his fingertips reverently along the back of the armchair where she’d surely sat.

 

It’s fucking intolerable sometimes, knowing she’d been so close to him and yet just out of his reach. When he comes back to find his little gifts discovered and her perfume still lingering in the air he wants to hit something. Sometimes he does. And yet there are some days, like today, when he can push aside the resentment long enough to be grateful there are versions of her still roaming the universe. It would be selfish to begrudge her that just because he can’t be with her. He’s trying not to be such a selfish prick this go round, at least where his wife is concerned.

 

With a pained sigh, the Doctor carefully picks up her empty plate and teacup to take them into the kitchen. As he turns, he catches sight of the chalkboard and he’d recognize that succinct archaeologist script anywhere. His mouth goes dry and the delicate china in his grasp wobbles and clinks together. He barely notices, eyes scanning the message she’d left behind.

 

_Hello Sweetie_ , along with a set of coordinates. _Come home xx_.

 

The Doctor swallows thickly, calculating the coordinates in his head.

 

Darillium. She’d given him coordinates to Darillium.

 

Home.

 

The china slips from his grasp and shatters as it hits the floor but the Doctor doesn’t hear it – he’s already moving toward the console. His hands shake and his hearts pound as he pilots his ship to the place where he’d spent one night and twenty-four years saying goodbye and all the while he tells himself _she won’t be there, don’t be an idiot, she won’t fucking be there_.

 

When he peers fearfully out the TARDIS doors, self-loathing already rising in his throat like bile for being so weak as to _hope_ , River is there. She’s standing in their back garden and grinning at him, Darillium’s bright sunshine making her curls gleam. He steps numbly out onto the grass, gazing at her unblinkingly, and wonders if he’s gone mad again.

 

“Did you ever stop?”

 

He scowls. “Don’t be sassy. I won’t have a sassy hallucination.”

 

“I’m a hallucination, am I?” Tilting her head, River smiles gently. “And here I thought I was _always there_ to you.”

 

The Doctor blinks, his hearts suddenly in his mouth, and not for the first time in the presence of the force of nature he’d fallen in love with, he can’t think of a damn thing to say.

 

She steps closer and he catches the scent of her – that ever-lingering smell of violets and something else, something new. River smells like books, old books and new books and every book ever written. There are shadows in her eyes but she’s still smiling and her laughter is choked with tears as she wraps herself in his quaking arms and whispers, “Darling, you’ll never believe where I’ve just been.”


End file.
